Today we received a letter from Santander letting us know that the new total for the mortgage is £64,425.00 Yay! The letter then informs us that our monthly payments will now go down by the princely amount of......wait for it, drumrole...... £1.80 .... Awww!

At first we felt quite let down but on reviewing it, over a year that comes to £21.60 saved against a paltry £5 over a year if we left it sitting in our savings account! Personally I would rather be bringing down that total anyway! This way we are heading slowly but surely to our target of becoming mortgage free with another £16.60 saved!

Today I visited our local Barnados charity shop with a bag bulging with de-cluttered articles! Great feeling! Unfortunately I came out of the shop with another 2 bags of bargains! :) For £10 (everything is 99p) I got 4 t shirts, 1 shortsleeved jumper, 1 beautiful teal varigated wool shawl, a Cath Kidson magnetic board with a shopping list and notebook attached and 3 toys for when my little grandaughter visits! Very pleased with this, my first visit to a charity shop since I hurt my foot!

Cooking up a storm today, 2 packs of half price steak and kidney in the slowcooker, half of which are now 2 steak and kidney puddings (using up some of the approved foods suet mix) the other half is bubbling away as a stew with yummy dumplings in! If I have any spare energy I shall go make some apple cinnamon muffins, need to use up some apples for the box delivery!